biohazard wrote:The biggest difference is that Islam is lagging behind a few centuries, nowadays Christians mainly bombard innocents from 30,000 feet or something

But yeah, fundamental Islam feels like some kind of hate religion: nowhere else do religious leaders radiate such hatred and malevolence than in some Islamic countries. And since the people are completely brainwashed, they happily blow themselves up to gory bits in hope of a few virgins or whatever they're promised nowadays... (Playstation 3 and a six-pack of Coke or something?)

Very nice comparison,reminds me of the israel-palestine conflict where Israel has one of the most modern Air Force and Hamas has rockets.May be if we catch the Islamic terrorists we should spray pig blood and fat on them and make them eat pork so that they never reach "Heaven"

alextemplet wrote:I wonder how the term "fundamentalist" came into being to describe extremist religion. Is religion fundamentally an extreme thing? If so, I would think fundies would not be such a minority.

I don't think so.But its not logical to believe that a small minority can be so influential.

"Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution"
-Theodosius Dobzhansky

DavidGeorge wrote:I don't think so.But its not logical to believe that a small minority can be so influential.

Actually it is, for two reasons. One, fundies are a very small minority, and they are very influential. Two, almost everything is decided by the small but vocal minority. Look at politics, for example.

Anyway, I'm still curious as to how the word "fundamentalist" came to describe religious extremism.

Generally speaking, the more people talk about "being saved," the further away they actually are from true salvation.

There is as much proof on evolution as on any other theory that's been scientifically tested. Strictly speaking you cannot even "prove" that the Earth is round, since this all could be just your dream and that in reality you are a tentacle-faced Martian ant having a millennium-long nap or something, and when you wake up you notice that there even isn't such thing as Earth. Let's all go watch The Matrix now, shall we!

Except that everything is within the context of definable terms, in which we define the earth as the observable planet upon which we live. (of course there are better definitions)so to say the earth is round is to say that the ground which we observe below us is the surface of a distinct mass within our observable universe that is spherical in shape.we can only draw conclusions on what can be empirically observed as reality.

What did the parasitic Candiru fish say when it finally found a host? - - "Urethra!!"

Well, I just meant that you cannot even know whether your observations are correct. Even if you were 99.9999999% sure that what you observe is real (like that the Earth is round), there can always be some catch that never even occured in your mind. The Earth was just an example, of course it's one of those things that we can be sure of if we can be sure of anything. But, "Cogito, ergo sum", like that Descartes guy said. You can only be sure that you exist, all else has a degree of uncertainty ;)

Sure, but that type of speculation (however intriguing) has no place in science. Science is grounded in empirical fact otherwise it cannot progress to further discovery. This is why scientists necessarily have to reject a creator or Flying Spaghetti Monster as non-scientific until such a time as one of these entities chooses to become empirically observable.

To state it in a somewhat mathematical sense: You say that there's a chance that all that we perceive as reality is false. Well if that is true then the probability would be the same for everything within our reality. An apple would be just as likely to be non-real as a monkey. Well when the only tools we have to help us determine reality are the things we can observe, then the relativity of it all renders the possibility of non-reality pointless. See what I'm saying? It's like having the same variable in both the numerator and the denominator. They cancel each other out. Until something empirically calls into question the reality of what we know, there's no point in speculating the possibility of non-reality.

And to end on a positive note: you're right that there should always be speculation as to the truth of scientific fact. But this speculation should arise through observation and testing.

What did the parasitic Candiru fish say when it finally found a host? - - "Urethra!!"